Transparent Answer 透明アンサー
by MK26
Summary: What if Izaya's attitude was actually somewhat developed from a guilt he had gotten long ago? Based off a song by Jin, Transparent Answer. Izaya/Oc -A possible one shot, if only the first chapter is read-
1. Transparent Answer

**Transparent Answer ****透明アンサー**

**_I'm very much loving the Transparent Answer by Jin. The story is not beta-ed so expect mistakes! Enjoy. I might turn this one shot into an OC story, who__ knows?_**

Izaya fidget his switchblade in his hands. At the tip, there was a barely readable engraving, 'Happy Birthday Izaya!'. He would never forget the person who remembered his birthday. Her smiling face and her crying face. Her death that had unconsciously brought a guilt that he carried for years.

She always smiled at him, as much as he doesn't like to admit it, he had grown fond of her. She hadn't found his red eyes as scary, she wasn't afraid of him like most of his other classmates. Most of the times she would be daydreaming, sheepishly smiling when she couldn't answer any of the questions asked by the teacher.

Yet she was cheerful all the time, she would try to make him smile everyday. She would share her red scarf when it was winter and he wasn't wearing enough garments.

"Your scarf doesn't match your eyes." Izaya would say.

"But it matches yours." She would reply.

She would scold him gently when he wanted to simply stop living this life, to cease to exist.

"To think that is absurd." She claimed.

She was one of the few that remembered his birthday and gave him a present. Yet he had done nothing when he saw her crying alone at the classroom. His thoughts were to leave her alone and let her clear her thoughts a while.

What Izaya didn't expect was when he found her absence from the school. At first, he only felt an uneasy feeling when he found the girls in his class crying a week later. But when he saw the flowers they carried, he understood everything.

Her heart that was hurt was gone already. She had hid everything behind those curtains of smiles. She had been cheerful for his sake. If only he had confronted and comforted her that day.

He kept staring at the flowers that was placed on her table. Around her table there were paper cranes made from her test papers. He knew that she had folded them somewhat absentmindedly during class periods. He picked them up one by one and followed the trail. It led to one paper crane by the window.

It was made from his test paper that he torn into pieces last time. Traces of glue and tape was all over it. On one wing was his test mark, '100%'; On the other was her neat writing, 'good job'.

"I thought you said it was absurd to think that." he mumbled.

Izaya changed after the incident but he could still remember her flowing scarf, her deep sea eyes, her smile.

Her importance to him.


	2. Akairo, age 17

**Thanks for the review, I really appreciated it! Anyways, don't read the rest of the chapters if you don't want to continue the story. You can always treat the previous chapter as a one-shot. Up to you C:**

Izaya was clicking away in the chat room again. He was bored and craved for some entertainment in his beloved humans. Soon, he found his target, too obvious for the room title was just depressing. He smirked and entered the room without any hesitation. This would be easy, he thought.

In a few hours of chatting, he had actually managed to get all the information and trust he needed in order to start his entertainment. He had after all did much research about suicide when he had lost his closest friend in elementary school, a friend that he had somehow felt attracted to, though Izaya would deny it in front of everyone.

His target this time was called Akairo, just reached her 17th birthday and was depressed about her family issues. Apparently, her parents had very much forgotten about her and hated her. She had loathed her very being and just wanted to end it all. It was so easy, it didn't even need to take a day. He was very lucky to catch her like that.

All he needed was to ask her if she wanted to end her life with him, and she agreed immediately. They were to meet two blocks away from the Russian Sushi by eight tonight. Izaya checked the clock, it was only six, he can take his sweet time to Ikebukuro. Happily swirling in his comfortable chair, he recalled the reason he had taken up this find-the-suicidal-girl hobby.

Izaya wanted to help them realised that the world is still spinning and problems can be solved, only that he is using a more indirect way to tell them. So, in the end of the day, if they still thinks that it is hopeless to save themselves anymore, it wasn't his right to get in their way of attaining death.

He swung himself of his chair and dialed up a few numbers, preparing his men to kidnap the girl. She had told him that she would wear bracelets with three colours, red, yellow and green. She also told him that she was eager to meet him, to get to know this person that have the same thoughts with her.

"Time to go Shizu-chan's territory." Izaya sung, though he had noted to swerve out of the blonde ex-bartender's way today, he wasn't one to ruin his own plan. He had also dialed Celty to save the girl from the kidnappers, forward his message to meet at the rooftop, the usual routine everytime.

He had time to stop by Russian Sushi, with the man speaking japanese in thick Russian accent.

"Sushi, Izaya? Sushi good!"

"Sure, give me some ootoro." Izaya casually walked into the restaurant and sat down. He had finished his sushi by 7:30, so he proceeded to walk to their "accurate" meeting place, the rooftop.

The girl who had no knowledge of his plans, walked towards Russian Sushi. Before she could reach her destination, two men dressed in black grabbed her from behind and pulled her into the dark alleyway.

Just before she could slip into unconscious from the lack of oxygen, a loud neigh could be heard through the streets. Celty came into her view and fended the men off, and bending down to her height. Though no matter how young the girl was, there was something off about her age, which Izaya told her to look out for the 17 year old.

"H-headless Rider?"

[Are you okay?] Celty quickly typed in her PDA. The girl nodded her head strongly, quite relieved that she was saved.

[Kanra said she wants to meet you at the rooftop of the building 3 blocks away from here.] Celty dutifully relayed the message to the his "victim". She had also noted to stay near the building just in case she really jumps.

The girl nodded and went off towards the building. She wasn't an athletic person, so the staircase seemed to be never-ending for her. Breathing in one deep breath, she opened the door towards the rooftop.

There she saw the shadow of the person she was suppose to meet, except that it was a man.

"Hi, Akairo." Izaya said as he turned around to face the girl, pausing his actions when his eyes met hers.

Her blue eyes that glowed in the dark was not matching the red scarf she had around her neck.


	3. Meeting Hitomi Hamako

**I wasn't very satisfied with this chapter, I had to squeeze my life out to wring out another 400+ words and it wasn't very nice at all. Anyways... those reviewers with accounts I shall PM, those without, why are you making me write here! Nah just joking, love you all. C:**

**AFK: Glad you were surprise... xD Thanks for reading and reviewing! I'm no genius, just a fool writing about a genius xD I knowwwww, I love Mekaku City Days (≧ ∇ ≦ )/**

**Michelle: MICHY! Thanks! I shall express my utmost gratitude when you're free again :D**

**Disclaimers: I don't own Durarara! This is indeed, 100% a fanfiction. F.A.N.F.I.C.T.I.O.N C:**

"Amano...?" It couldn't be, she was dead! All these years of research had confirmed it! He, he even attended her funeral. 'Amano' lowered her eyelids a bit and asked him.

"Who? Who are you? Who's Amano?" Her eyes were blinking confusedly. "Isn't Kanra a girl?"

With hearing her question, he snapped back to reality. Impossible, he thought, no one comes back from the grave. He plastered on his smirk and looked at her again, with confidence renewed.

"Of course, of course, I'm Kanra!~ I'm also Orihara Izaya!~ Hi Akairo!~" He spun in circles around Akairo. Sure, the red scarf and blue eyes were distracting, but Izaya managed to make himself believe that the blue eyes were just coloured contacts and red scarf were just a fashion trend among teenagers.

Although, he was quite convinced the girl had managed to trick him about her age and other information, for she didn't look like a 17 year old and she wasn't in a very sad mood. A con perhaps, Izaya thought, All the better the entertainment is. In his mind, it wasn't really enjoying to torment a soul that looked exactly like his close friend.

"Orihara... Izaya?" The girl murmured under her thin scarf. She hadn't thought that the person she was expecting was him though. The informant in Ikebukuro that no one would want to have any physical or even mental contact with. She was kind of afraid of him, looking nervously at her feet.

Now you're doomed, she thought to herself.

"You are going to jump anyways so why don't you tell me your name?" Izaya's smug grin continued to surface. He was so interested in knowing her name, since he couldn't find any information related to her in any ways, he presumed she just arrived in the city or something.

"I wasn't going to ju-" She was cut short by his voice.

"Now, now, that's not important~ What's your name?~ That's important~" Izaya continued digging her information, now that he lost very much of his entertainment.

"I-I'm Hitomi Hamako. Nice to meet you." She bowed slightly out of her habit. She was always a polite person all her life anyways.

"Are you sure you don't know anyone named Amano?~" Izaya couldn't help but curiously wonder, maybe, just maybe, she was a lookalike family member although he had by any chance would have known already.

Hamako's eye seemed to close a little more, her eyes radiating sadness and nervousness. She then looked back at him and shook her head firmly. "No one that I can remember of." She ended the topic with a firm stare.

Izaya knew he couldn't continue any further but he could always ask around for information now that he had her name. His interest in her now averted to her purpose of lying in the chat room and tricking him into thinking he had to come for his victim.

"Why are you here?" Izaya started his direct questioning again. "You aren't here for any suicide talking, this is simply too obvious. You're not a very smart one to try to even have a sad mask up."

Hamako nervously laughed before she could reply, her head dizzy from meeting one of the most dangerous man in Ikebukuro. Though little did she know, everything was going to be more interesting, but at the moment, not for her.

"I was suppose to be talking people out of their suicide mode, though I'm not at all a very good speaker. I guess I hope to be more of a contribute to some people? I wish to cheer many people up actually..." Hamako trailed off, remembering her audience was an informant in Ikebukuro, which meant he would actually remember her details to gain an advantage.

"A-Actually, I need to run now. I, uh, have to grab some materials for my job. Uh, goodnight." She fastly stringed her sentences out before dashing down the stairs, face flushing red from nervousness. She mentally scolded herself to not stumble her words next time.

Izaya looked from above, from where he had positioned himself from hours ago. Under the street lamps, he could vaguely see her scarf flowing with the breeze she created from running away.

He went straight home after he found himself staring at the empty street for some time. He had to sort his thoughts out soon, in this state, he would be vulnerable to his beloved humans, one thing that he didn't like at all.

The first thing he did when he reached home was to turn on his computer and went around looking for an answer. An answer that made him felt weak because he couldn't find it yet. A question that he couldn't even answer, he wasn't fit to be an informant like that if he couldn't know every of his lovable humans.

_Who was Hamako Hitomi? Where had she come from?_


	4. Twelve year disappearance

**I didn't know where I'm going in this chapter, so just treat it like an introduction to Hamako's life. I'm a sensitive person, please don't hurt my tiny heart. (I lost a follower *sniff*) o3o Please don't mind Suzume, I might expand her story when I have time. Review replies' times (PMing those that I can access with PMs)**

**AFK: Thanks! Of course I know Children Record! Why did you even ask :D Naaaah it's not long at all, very much appreciated in fact C: *glomps* By the way, may I ask what does your name means? For some weird reason I kept reading it as Away From Keyboard...**

**DarkFlame Alchemist: I don't think I ever replied you here, buuuuut I love yaaaaaaa! Thanks for reading and understanding my fail attempt of suspense... **

All Hamako could see was darkness. It was impossible to even the hand she had raised in front of her. The same dream again then, she thought as she sat down and sighed. The water under her rippled from the movement.

The silence was slowly eating away her soul. She splashed the water with her legs, getting the weird combination of floating, sitting on water. The dream always lasted from the moment she fell asleep until she woke up, just one dream for almost all her life.

"Who would save me from this place," Hamako wondered out loud. From a far end of the abyss was a rustling noise. Then she knew the dream had ended and the nightmare had started. She always prepared herself beforehand yet she would always still wake up in a shock. Vulnerable me, she thought.

Crash! The loud noise broke the dark dimension and out came walls of blood splattered on them. She was no longer standing on clear water but pools and pools of blood. There were gigantic trees that loomed over her short being, intimidating her all the way. There were some crowd noises, a cold sensation that ran down Hamako's spine.

She dropped to the floor and hugged herself tightly, clearly traumatized by the events flashing through her eyes. Why? Why was she dreaming about this? Why this again? Her lungs contracted a moment, temporarily slowing down her breathing rate, suffocating her until she woke up with cold sweat and eyes filled with fear. On the verge of spilling tears.

She sat on the bed for a while as she grabbed a drink. It was around six in the morning and she couldn't go into sleep anymore. She stared out at the window, finishing her drink and taking her materials to get ready for work soon.

The flowers and wrappers she bought were as fresh as yesterday, her preservation had been good. Hamako smiled as she worked through a few hours and wondered what new customers would she get today.

Izaya was reading the file he had made for the information he had gotten for Hamako Hitomi. It piqued his interest when he started arranging the information into groups.

'At age twelve, Hamako was officially adopted by the Hitomi family.' Yet he couldn't find any information that concerned her before that timeline. It was like she disappeared for twelve full years. He briefly wondered again if Amano was Hamako since she died when she was twelve but remembered the birth certificate that was under Hamako's name.

"Hamako Hitomi, born on 23rd of August 1989, currently age 23, owns a florist in Ikebukuro named 'Hanging Gardens of Babylon'...? Hm... time to pay a visit to my beloved humans again!" Izaya sang in high pitched, grabbing his trademark fur coat and literally flying out of Shinjuku.

Hamako changed her 'close' sign into 'open' sign as she peered out to the crowding city. She was wearing a simple short apron, having no keen interest in getting her clothes dirty from cleaning the shop. Not that it was that dirty of something, it was just a clean habit she had gotten from young age.

"Oh, that's fast." she muttered as she cheerfully welcomed her first customer. It was a young woman that was only slightly shorter than her. She looked perfect in Hamako's eye, filled with agile and elegance until she spot her eyes were staring forever at the same spot, barely turning to her direction.

"Oops, sorry. Didn't know you were there." she mumbled as she turned towards Hamako, looking with her pale hazel eyes. It was then Hamako knew she was blind. She helped her to a tall chair and tended to her customer. It was very usual routine, with the young woman, now known as Suzume Sen, promising she would come back every once in awhile for new stocks.

The chime at the florist's door rang again.

"Welcome!" She said out of habit.

"Oh, oh, what a paradise here!~" Hamako's head snapped towards the voice owner's direction at once. Oh boy, she wasn't wanting to seek any trouble with this man, either now or forever! Izaya made his way and self-serviced himself to sit on the soft chair.

"Never knew you own a pretty little florist, Mako-chan!~" Izaya proceed to make himself comfortable in her florist despite the brunette's obvious uncomfortable fidgeting.

"S-So, what are you looking for?" She stumbled again! Why must she be so clumsy around people like him? It must be that he kept noticing her, even when she always kept to herself in every possible ways. Although she must say, she is barely noticeable among the crowd, never ever stood out in any ways.

"I'm looking for you~" Izaya grinned, enjoying the red flower creeping into her cheeks. She felt like a kettle, over boiling itself. She hated the attention, she wants to just hide in a corner and disappear from his sight.

"I-I don't think I have such a flower named 'you'." She managed to fumble out some words that hadn't been burnt from her mind.

"Oh sure you do~ So, so, where were you when you were twelv-" Izaya's intended purpose dropped when he saw Shizuo looked into the glass window of the florist, spotting him. The glass windows barely filtered the loud voice.

"Izaaaaaaaaaayaaaaaaaaaaaa-kun!" And the angry Shizuo began marching towards the florist. Hamako panicked, a bit relief when she saw Suzume, trying to talk him out of it. Izaya jumped off the chair and headed outside.

"Bye bye Mako-chan!~ I'll see you later~" and he turned to Shizuo. "Hi Shizu-chan, wasn't expecting you near here, I never knew a monster that actually would want to be near any flower shop~"

And there goes another chase, with Hamako dumbfounded and Suzume panicking.


	5. Unpredictable human, number two

**Hi all! I won't be around for a week or so, so I can't update the next chapter soon. (Ho-o-o-o-lidays!) Please review and tell me how is it, sensitive heart, remember! xD**

**AFK: asfdasfd Thank you for reviewing once again! I would actually consider putting some of Mekaku City Days story into this one, but would be mainly focusing on just a story since you knowww the story title *looks up* I love your long reviews, makes me happy mappy :D It's okaaay, I forgot my character's name at one stage (_ _)/**

It was around a week since Izaya last went to Hamako's shop. He could admit he missed that smell of nature there, like he could actually relax and fall asleep there. Nonsense, he thought to himself, how can I possibly relax in Shizu-chan's territory?! He cleared his mind from those messy thoughts and decided to step into the smoking man's place again.

His reddish eyes darted around the street as he walked in those familiar roads. Surely any time now, Shizuo would probably suddenly turn up in front of him and there goes the cat and mouse. He first decided that he would escape to Hamako's place but decided against it, he will not bring any harm to her or her place.

Izaya frowned, when had he decided to care about his beloved humans' health. They were just for his entertainment sake. He unconsciously shook his head, then found a particular red scarf floating behind its owner. He grinned and followed his dear human, who hadn't figure out someone was tailing, or more directly, stalking her.

"Mwelcome." Hamako mumbled with her mouth full of the delicious chocolate cake she had gotten from her friend and frequent customer, whose name goes by Suzume. Hamako had to admit that she was just too amazingly to be able to make those desserts when she's blind.

"Aha~ Mako-chan's got a chocolate on her cheek!~" Izaya twirled and got near her, swiftly taking the chocolate crumb from her cheek and popped into his mouth. Hamako, with her tendency to blush, went red.

"Tasty!~ I take it that this is from your customer~" Izaya proceeded to look around the shop, with not much interest with the flowers, but more of the seller instead. As he shaded his eyes from the rising morning sun, he caught a glimpse of a shining thing that hung from her neck. It was begging his attention with the help of the sunlight hitting in.

With a closer look, he found out that it was actually a blue crystal that was encased in a glass cylinder necklace. It was rarely found in any shops that were in Ikebukuro, but there are quite a handful of shops that sells those in Shinjuku. In addition, it was painfully resembling something he gave Amano before.

Had it been a coincidence that she also possessed the same necklace, same scarf and eye colour as Amano? Or had it a case of identity theft? Or maybe it was just Izaya's mind being paranoid as usual? Izaya furrowed his brow from the things getting messier and messier, though he was quite sure he had some notes to read through mentally soon.

In fact, he was about to ask the key question now.

"Mako-chan~ What happened when you were born until you were twelve?~" Izaya was expecting her to be in shock and stumble her words again and in return, he was getting quite a shock instead.

"Not in Japan. Stayed in overseas." The reason smoothly rolled out of her mouth, she hadn't even pause a moment at her work of wrapping bouquets of flowers. If she was lying, Izaya deduced, she was almost the best liar ever. Neither had her showed any emotions, but her heartbeat probably hadn't changed even the slightly bit.

With her firm reason, Izaya stopped in asking, instead he wandered the inside of the shop. The previous time he stopped by, he couldn't enjoy the design of the florist yet, considering Shizuo screaming outside was one of the main reason.

The shop was quite nicely designed, with white wallpapers, every rack of flowers was neatly arranged and wasn't off at all.

"Mako-chan~ Are you a neat freak or something?" Not that Izaya wasn't a very messy person, though he had often messed up the contents of the chessboards that he owns.

"N-No! It's just the neat arrangement of the flowers makes me and my customers at ease." Aha, his Mako-chan had switched back to her original personality. Or was it by chance, just slipped her mask back? It was his second time unable to predict his humans, the first was given to Shizuo.

Either ways, he might have to categorize Hamako with Shizuo, but not that she had some supernatural abilities like Shizuo's strength. She intrigued him in a completely different way, one reason being that she had many similarities with Amano, another being that she seemed to have two different person at once.

Maybe that's how the world's twisted in a sick way, Izaya thought, grinning to himself. While Izaya was lost in his thoughts, Hamako had spotted one specific blonde ex bartender hovering outside. She was quite sure he hadn't seen Izaya yet so she quickly alerted the informant and very much shoved him out through the back door.

The shop was costly when she renovated it and she was quite certain that the informant nor the ex-bartender would offer to pay for the damage fees. Or even, the medical fees of hers. Not a minute later, Shizuo walked into her florist, and to her not-that-surprised feeling, followed a small figure.

"Suzume!" Hamako smiled sincerely.

"Hamako! I'm here to pick a few flowers to decorate my bakery again. Do you mind recommending?" Suzume clung tight to Shizuo, afraid that he might do something reckless.

Hamako noticed that the blonde was thankfully not smoking in her shop, for all the flowers were not born a smoker. Furthermore, she had actually found him not smoking around the blind girl. She was grateful for that, the girl wasn't a very strong person when it comes to health related subjects.

"Thanks Suzume, for bringing him a bit later, since I had an informant sitting in my shop earlier." She whispered in Suzume's ears, making sure that Shizuo couldn't hear her at all. She wasn't in any ways risking her shop door, no matter the front or back, to be torn down, just to be able to chase down a certain 'flea', however the tall man referred him as to.

They left soon, with Hamako finally letting out a sigh, wondering curiously if she should put up a sign in front of her store, indicating 'No informants allowed here, especially Orihara Izaya." She wasn't sure if she won't get any heart attack any days from now.


	6. Wavered first impression

**Taiwan was amazing... I bought so many stuff and spent all my money -w-... Anyways! I'm back with a chapter again~ Taiwan~ taiwan~ By the way, I'm writing a completely original story now with my friend so my updates might be slower, plus le exams (seriously?!)... I better study, mum throwing me to tuition soon. /shotdead/**

**AFK: I remember you *w* Tada! I'm home lol. My suspense iz running outttt! I've gotta scram to catch it, enjoy! Aaaaand good news(o.o?) for you, I'm adding some remake Mekaku City Days plots into the story so yea... Only 3 currently...**

Izaya wandered around Ikebukuro again, he had found himself lothering here more often after he met Hamako. He frowned, it couldn't be attachment, right? He was supposed to be superior. He shouldn't have such same feelings and need to be around someone. Though this habit actually came by after Amano's death, his need for independence so that he wouldn't hurt himself with the feelings anymore.

His brow furrowed in annoyance and he tried to shake the feeling away from him. He wasn't going to get attached to someone and he wasn't going to start it anytime now. He turned around the corner and headed to the Russian Sushi. If he wanted to 'play' with Shizuo, he had to fill up his stamina first.

As he strolled towards the sushi restaurant, he heard a faint calling for someone behind him. It was too quiet to be heard at first, but then when he strain his ear, his eye widen.

"Amano! Amano!" For a moment, he thought he saw the red-scarfed girl turned her head in response. She turned. She had responded to that same name he was carefully remembering for years.

Hamako seemed to suddenly realise something when she turned towards a smaller boy.

"Is that my lunch? Thanks, Ren." She smiled happily as she took the lunch box from Ren. She bent down and gave him a kiss on the cheek as a thanks for bringing it since she hadn't been planning to buy any lunch today.

"It's not Amano." She whispered in his ear when she straightened up again, a smile that did not reach her eyes was plastered on her face. The boy looked down in embarrassment and turn red. She then rubbed his head and gave him a small present as his smile returned again. He then turned and disappeared in the crowd.

Izaya couldn't hear what she had said, but he had saw that slightly dangerous smile that was on her face when she stood back up. He was speechless, his impression of Hamako was that she was innocent and naive. Oblivious to the world, seemingly living in her enclosed flowery dimension.

Hamako adjusted her scarf and headed to her shop, though she had thought she saw a certain informant with fluffy jacket. Not that she was planning to say that he wore such a jacket in the middle of summer, since she was wearing a scarf herself.

'It's thin.' She defended herself mentally as she headed away once again.

Izaya decided to give up his lunch and dig up more information about Hamako. He was quite certain she had a connection to Amano in someway. He was wondering in looking for the boy but he was too far to have heard his name. Something around -en. The Hitomi family isn't really an option too, considering they are overseas currently.

Yes, he would have to ask around the his humans, if they knew anyone that had appeared out of sudden lately. He turned to a few alleys and found some of his targets. Most of them was very air-headed, in Izaya's standard, as they knew nothing that he had wanted.

After asking around almost everywhere, Izaya was annoyed. No one seemed to be paying attention to this amazing city anymore. He couldn't always search the net, since not much information was always present. It was like nothing happened at all during this summer. That, or no one cared.

All the informations like 'Oh, yea, there was a rumour a new gang came out, came from Tokyo or something similar' or 'The city never changed! It's still very chaotic in here, but I heard the Dollars have new movements again!'. Izaya needed none of those. Since he couldn't find anything about the brown haired girl, he decided to check out the new gang just to take his frustration out of his mind.

Wait, the great Orihara Izaya would not get frustrated. Rephrase. He would check out the new gang to get himself updated, he seemed to be outdated these few days. Wait. Rephrase again. He's definitely not outdated of information. He would check out the new gang just for his entertainment sake. Finally, gosh, Izaya thought.

He turned back to the same alley that one of the Dollars member said about the new colour gang. At first, the member hadn't recognised the informant, but soon enough, he learnt his lesson.

"So what is this new colour gang about?~ Hm?~" Izaya's eyes closed into slits.

"I-I think that t-the name of the g-g-g-gang i-i-is B-Black S-S-traw..." The man trembled pathetically.

"I can't hear you~" Izaya taunted, warning him not to stumble his words anymore, he felt kind of impatient but a bit gleeful that the man was fearful of him. It was weird that he wasn't this impatient around Hamako though. She stumbled her words more frequently than this man, he guessed.

"I-I... Ahem! I mean I think the gang's name is Black Straw. The gang is from Tokyo, it is very big but I heard that the members in it are underground people like assassins and stuff. They are very scary."

"Tokyo...? Elite underground people, huh." Izaya let go of his collar and the man fled with tails in between his legs, literally. Izaya had not heard that there was an increase of any underground members so by chance they might be very smart and careful.

'But why join a gang when you're already the top?' He wondered. Sometimes, his humans are just very interesting to watch, he was glad he found his humans nice to observe. Izaya was spacing out as he fell deeply in thought.

Unfortunately, Shizuo spotted him in his current state.


	7. Calling for Mano

**Okay, I'm back with more but where ish DarkFlame Alchemist and AFK, I miss you guyssss... Have you guys given up hope of me? /sniff/ I'm very much rambling in this chapter but enjoy!**

**GrilledFlamingo: Are you edible? /drools/ Thanks for your support and I continue to live on! (/^O^)/~**

"Izaaaaaaaaayaaaa-kun!" A loud voice resounded through the city. Every passer-by smartly run off to somewhere safe. Izaya immediately snapped out of his thinking mind. Oh damn, he thought, I should run off somewhere too. As much as he thinks like that, his mouth had auto piloted itself. A smirk cut in and he replied.

"Oh hey, it's Shizu-chan!~ How fortunate of me, I wasn't expecting you today~" Izaya then thought, 'I wasn't expecting you all the times anyway.' but he think he would keep that to himself best.

Without a second word, Shizuo pulled up a vending machine and threw it towards Izaya. Izaya didn't manage to dodge the whole thing and fell onto the floor. His vision threatened to blacken for a moment before he scrambled to his feet and ran off towards another direction. All these times he had still had that grin on his face. Perhaps it was a permanent side effect?

In the end, Izaya found that he couldn't answer that question. Shizuo had cornered him in an alley with a dead end. Izaya whipped out his switchblade and slowly turned towards Shizuo. He was not sure if he had a concussion or not from the machine earlier.

"Awww, Shizu-chan wants to play with me." Izaya taunted, but no longer in the sing-song voice, as he felt that he had not much breath left from the exhausting run around the big city. Shizuo had not noticed the lacking of it, he was just prepared to shorten the lifespan of a flea.

"Say your last words." Shizuo mumbled as he kept swinging his sign at Izaya. Izaya could dodge fairly quickly with his few years of experience, but it all stopped when he stepped into a puddle of water. Shizuo managed to slam the sign on Izaya's chest on full force.

He flew back from the force of the impact and collided with the wall backwards. Izaya slid down the wall. Somewhere on his head, he was bleeding, he knew it because there was a trail of blood flowing down his face.

Shizuo half expected the flea to still stand up, but Izaya knew better than to stand up. He had broken ribs. Not one but a few. He could feel his vision going darker and darker, with tiny black dots spreading over it. Shizuo stood there, wondering if he should finish the flea or leave before the police come or...

"Shizuo...?" There was a barely noticeable voice beside him. Shizuo turned and looked down.

"Can you please spare him? Maybe bring him to Shinra's...? Izaya racked his brain to recognise this familiar voice. It was gentle, yet sorrowful, so alluring that he finally closed his eyes and gave up to the pull of darkness. Shizuo looked at him, then back at the voice owner. He remembered her when Suzume brought him to a shop last time.

"You're Suzume's friend?" Shizuo asked. The girl nodded, her scarf wrapped around her neck rather tightly. Shizuo looked at Izaya again, his face a bit frustrated and angry, but still decided to call Shinra.

After All, Suzume didn't have a lot of people around her that cared about her for her true self, and not for her disability. Shinra answered immediately and told them Celty was going to fetch them, but Shizuo and Hamako had to go to Shinra's by their own means.

"I'm going to walk." Hamako claimed, after Celty sped off to her destination.

"I'll follow." Shizuo said, as he took out his cigarette and lit it. Hamako wrinkled her nose slightly and looked away, she had asthma. She held her breath for a very long while, not wanting to breathe in the polluted air Shizuo just created.

"Sorry." Shizuo noticed as he took in another long breath before throwing the cigarette into the bin responsibly. Hamako nodded in thanks before they continued the silence again. Shizuo wondered promptly, about this girl who actually dared to stop him directly from killing his mortal enemy.

"So, who are you?" Shizuo had not to bother to ask why she knew his name, for every resident in Ikebukuro knew his name. Not in a good way though. She was humming a tune, letting her guard down beside Ikebukuro's monster, for god's sake!

"Hamako, Hitomi Hamako. Just Hamako though." She coughed a few times, a side effect from the smoky air earlier. Silence came back and she stared at the sky, as if it was very interesting, until they reached Shinra's house.

"He have a concussion, three broken ribs, a mild cut on his foreheads but nothing else." Shinra announced as he walked out of a room, shooting a glance at Shizuo to not do anything on his watch.

Shizuo shrugged and sat down on a sofa, quickly followed by a humming Hamako. Shinra looked at her and whispered to Shizuo about her identity. Shizuo had only know her name and that she was Suzume's friend.

Before Shinra could turn and asked her, a loud groan was heard inside the room. Shinra rushed into it and followed the other three. Hamako was practically the fastest of all four. Izaya was trying to kick and turn but luckily was unable to move much anyways.

"Amano... Mano-chan... Mano..." He mumbled as his face screened with a sheet of cold sweat. Shinra checked him again and found no bandages came out and deduced that it was just his pain so he doubled the painkillers.

[Who's Amano?] Celty typed on her PDA. Shinra and Shizuo shrugged but Hamako stood there.

"I know who she is, so can I have some time with Izaya for a while? Alone?" Hamako bravely stated. The company came to a decision that she probably worshipped him or was his friend but they left the room.

"Mano... Where are you? Mano! Mano!..." Izaya's speech was slurred as he continued without opening his eyes.

"Shhh... Shh... Mano's here. Mano's here. Shh... It's okay... Mano's here... Go to sleep..." Hamako softly comforted then hummed a quiet lullaby until Izaya went back to his slumber. She smiled at him and adjusted his covers again before moving out of the room, thinking no one heard her.

Shizuo was behind the door and moved into the shadows in time as she opened the door, said her thanks and went off.

'Was Hamako, Amano?' Shizuo wondered. He wondered who was this Amano person, who was this Hamako person. He needed answers for his curiosity.


	8. Comforting Hamako

**This... is sloppy. But whateverrrrr, I'm going to write an extra chapter to accompany this chapter. Enjoy and review! They're my cookies for the day C:**

**AFK: /hugs/ Yaaaaay! Your ps... It's OKAY. I like, tried my best for that part but considering the other fictions I had read... I felt like trash... Anyways! Uh which Ren you're thinking xD 'Cause I'm thinking of a friend hahaha. But yea... I tend to use Ren for many many characters in the past which I had taken no considerations in posting! /IusetouseQuizillahaha/ But AFK~~~ Create a FF account so I shall message you for fun!~**

After that day, Hamako had visited Izaya everyday although she only went when he is sleeping. Shinra and Celty hadn't said a word about it, assuming that she was either a very close friend or she actually had fall in love with him. She denied the latter every time though but Shinra did notice a pink tinge to her face when she did that.

Izaya had finally recovered, but Shinra still told him to not run due to his ribs. There were still some bruising here and there and his chest was still in bandage. Izaya helped himself out, thanked Shinra in his own way. He could remember the voice and the lullaby song.

A song that Amano taught him to hum. At least, tried to. He was stubborn and did not follow her to hum it. Amano didn't know it but he did hum it once or twice at home when he misses her. Who said that he didn't listen to her 'classes'? He hummed again, and almost broke into a skip before reminding himself about his injuries.

He swerved out of Shizuo's way and went down the street that leads him to the florist. Before he pushed open the glass door and welcomed himself, he spot another shorter figure talking to his Hamako. Wait, did he just said 'his'?

Anyways, Hamako was talking or rather, chatting rather happily with the smaller figure. Izaya squinted his eyes and remembered that was the boy whose name ended with -en. He pressed his ears to the window and finally heard his name.

"-Ren! Go tell the girl then! I'm rather sure Hiyori would be jumping in joy."

"B-But! What if she rejects?" Ren Hitomi worriedly asks. His sister and him were very close, they would know everything about each other. And Izaya knew that when he saw them talking to each other, somewhere in his intellectual brain told him so.

"Oh come on, Hiyori has 'I'm interested in Ren' written all over her face! Just go look out for her like maybe, this Saturday, tomorrow? You free?" Hamako casually replied. Izaya never saw this side of her before, he's used to the polite and nervous Hamako.

"This Saturday is... August 15. Yes, I'm free... Thanks Hamako!" Ren smiled in his young boy version and went out of the shop. Hamako sat there for a while, finishing her tea. She had yet to notice Izaya outside, had pulled Ren to a side.

"O-Orihara?!" Ren panicked.

"Ren, do you know Amano?" Izaya immediately went into serious questionings.

"Uh, I-I, uh, I don't know!" Ren shouted in reply. He made a promise for that secret.

His shouts however, caught Hamako's attention. She ran out of the florist and looked around, finding Ren near Izaya, his eyes tightly shut. Hamako was angry, how dare the informant tried to go after her brother! This was unforgivable.

"Let go of him now!" Hamako had forgotten about being nervous and all. All she cared was her brother half scared to death. Now that she had lost enough in many events, she was rather protective of her family.

Izaya wasn't expecting her to shout at him, his chest shrunk an inch. From hurt? He wondered. Ren saw his sister and quickly ran towards her and away from Izaya. He smiled, perhaps to everyone that actually still looked like a smirk, for Hamako said again.

"Do not ever go near him ever." Hamako's warning glare could kill him if looks could kill. Now that he had witnessed so many sides of Hamako, he wondered if Hamako was actually the innocent person he had had for the first impression. It seemed that she was hiding so many secrets beneath that cheery look.

"Yes, yes, Mako-chan!" Izaya saluted her. he had said yes, but he would bother Ren another day. He was known to be digging information out in any ways. He was so intrigued by Hamako now. He headed back, preparing himself for the coming Monday. It wasn't very long anyways.

What he didn't expect was on Monday, Ren Hitomi had left the country. Hamako was looking very gloomy and she wasn't very talkative anymore. She was rather sloppy at her work and slow.

"Mako-chan?~" Izaya tried to annoy her, only to fail.

"Yes? Welcome, how can I help you?" It was like Hamako's on auto pilot mode. She hadn't even recognise him. Izaya didn't understand this sudden change in her. Why had Ren left the country suddenly? Didn't he say he was to confess to a girl on Saturday? It couldn't be rejection that made him left to overseas.

"I wan- Never mind." Izaya stopped when he decided to continue to quietly observe Hamako. Asking would do him and her no good now. She was clearly traumatized.

Hamako Hitomi kept looking at her hands, as if they would be able to tell her the answer. It still felt... disgusting. Hamako could still feel the blood on her hands, it felt like it had permanently stained there forever.

Hamako finally broke down. She sat there as her tears kept sliding down her cheeks, there were no sounds made though. She just stared at the space, covering her mouth as her tears spilled on the floor. Izaya was stunned, he wasn't expecting her to suddenly drop on the floor.

Then, Izaya did the most shocking thing he never done in his life. He pulled Hamako into his arms and comforted her. It was then Hamako could start crying, with sound. She sobbed and sobbed, from morning until evening. Until she fell asleep from her exhaustion.

Izaya carried her to the sofa bed and left her there, he covered her with a makeshift blanket, locked the florist door from the inside before he made sure no one could go in from the outside. He spared another glance at her sleeping form before he left for home.

Perhaps, perhaps, he would just stop looking information for the day and wonder what overcame him to show care for someone.


	9. Extra: Hitomi No Sekai Jijou

**This is an extra chapter, but let's just call it Chapter 9 /haha/. This one is based off Kagerou Days **_**and**_** Konoha no Sekai Jijou. Have fun reading, it's not that long. This one accompanies chapter 8 by the way.**

Saturday came like a speeding light. Hamako sleepily woke up from her deep sleep. The first thing she remembered was that her brother was to confess to his best friend today. She silently prayed for his success. She noticed the clock on her wall stopped, and wondered maybe the clock ran out of battery. It stopped on 12:15 in the afternoon.

She could hear the buzzing noises from the city outside of her apartment window. She looked downstairs and saw her brother waving goodbye to her.

"See you later!" He smiled and headed off. She waved back and could smell the lunch he had happily prepared for her. The city of Ikebukuro was normal, like any day yesterday. There were noises from crowds, happy and even sad voices.

Slightly worried about Ren, she finished and washed up in less than a blink of an eye. She would go and see how things would turn out. She hoped that she would actually see Ren and Hiyori's smiling faces though. They were very sweet and nice people she knew in her life. Hamako wondered if Hiyori brought her cat out with her again while meeting Ren. Ren liked her cat too.

Hamako spotted the two people from a distance, the hot summer sun casting on them. Just when she was about to sneakily follow them, she saw Ren pushed Hiyori away as the traffic light turned red, with a smile on his face before the truck slammed right into him. Hiyori cried as she watched the whole thing going on before her. Hamako just stood there and stared at the messy blood splatters. Blaring horns and crowd noises filled her ears. It was a dream, she told herself.

She thought she saw a shadow version of Ren and Hiyori standing beside them. Ren's was smirking at him as the eyes of the cat stared through every soul.

It wasn't the end yet.

Hamako looked at her hands and blinked. The blood of her brother was spilled on her hands as she unconsciously reached out for him earlier. Such a dangerous world, she thought she could hear someone near her said. She had just stood there, couldn't do anything but stood there. Ren and Hiyori, both stained in blood. She didn't understand. She couldn't understand.

Then again, Hamako saw the clock's hands turn anti-clockwise. The melting summer heat burning on the glass surface, making everything distorted like in a TV. Everyone around her turned again. Ren and Hiyori was crossing the street again, this time being Hiyori walking faster. Her turn into a mess. All the time, Hamako kept running and running, her hands outstretched, trying to reach them before the truck came again.

Again and again, she kept failing. Unable to catch them, unable to do anything but run. The sound of cicadas filled the emptiness of the summer, nothing had changed, everyone was oblivious.

The TV sets in the shops were all having one same picture. A broken clock with a bloody handprint on it. It was disturbing. August kept going again and again, no one seemed to understand what is happening. The constant buzzing of the electronics were humming into her ears. The blood that kept on spilling, and with understanding, Hamako knew that she was struck with helplessness.

Maniac laughters sounded around them as the happy memories of them seemed to get wiped away by bloody prints and broken hearts. The rain was washing away everything. The clock stopped going anti-clockwise, it started working again. Today was at the end, rewritten by Hiyori. Everyone walked by them like a normal accident had happened.

Hamako could still see the blood that was in her hands. Red, full of disappointment and in the same time, a reminder. It was so quick that she couldn't even catch her breath. Ren was standing there, unable to speak anymore. All he could do was look at the previous spot she was standing earlier. When she was alive.

August 16, they held Hiyori's funeral near her house. Hamako and Ren came, they were the only ones that hadn't shed a tear. Ren broke down when he went home. Hamako called their parents, booked a flight for him to leave immediately tomorrow. Their parents understood and brought him back quick. Hamako packed his bag for him. Ren was like a walking dead, his eyes hollow and filled with mild hatred to the world.

That eyes.


	10. Flowers made from straws

**Just when I was about to published this and iz upset about no reviews... There goes me updates! C:**

**Smile9316: My saviourrrrrrrrrrrrr! Thanks for reviewing~ You healed me broken heart lol. Wazzit confusing? /goes back to previous chappy to look/ Oh! The last words... You should watch 'Konoha no Sekai Jijou' to kinda understand it :3**

"It seems that there was a murder that happened near the national park. The victim is according to the police, the head of an underground business. His goods are scattered everywhere and the police believes that some of it are missing..."

Suzume had stopped walking when she heard the voice reporting about the news in the TV. Shizuo turned to walk back to her, confusingly looked at the TV. He then figured Suzume just stopped to listen to the news.

"I bet it's the flea who created the mess." Shizuo scoffed before Suzume hesitantly agreed before walking on.

Izaya had been wondering who did this while he stood at the shadows, quietly observing the police trying to gather evidence. They had been at this case for hours and it seemed to him nothing had progressed. He snickered at the uselessness of the police for a moment.

"It's going to be interesting!~" Izaya sang as he walked away from the scene. Before he could completely leave, he saw another figure hiding in the shadows as well. Shizu-chan?, he thought, then denied it. Shizuo was not one to hide around. He was one straightforward person. Izaya took another better look at the figure. It was wearing a loose dark-coloured hoodie. There was a vaguely seen black rose with green stalk that was casually placed in the pocket. With a closer look, Izaya finally figured what the whole thing was made out of.

It was made of straws.

"Black Straw?" It was the new colour gang's work then, Izaya deduced. The rumour must be true that they had professionals in the gang. Izaya had done some good research about the colour gang. It originated not from Tokyo but from Osaka. The members in it had been knowing each others longer than the colour gangs' history, which only meant it just picked up the term colour gang when it came to Ikebukuro. When it was just a powerful group back then, the members had used dogtags to show their identities, but it became black coloured straws when it came to Ikebukuro.

Izaya grinned to himself, wondering about the people in the gang. It wasn't a large group like Dollars, every member were carefully picked and they were not recognisable unless others were also the same gang members. In return, no one outside the ring had known who the members were, much less the head of the whole group.

He wondered what was the requirements to get into the gang, since he was rather sure the secrets in there must be a lot. He was getting a bit too over his head, so he frown and looked back at the spot where the hooded figure was, it was no longer there. Perhaps went back to report to the leader?

Speaking of which he had not visited Hamako ever since he left her in her shop the week before last. He wanted to give her some personal space for the time, but probably no one thought he was capable to give others personal space. All that information hunting and stuff, but he was and he just did. He didn't mind what everyone thought, except for Amano, but that's the past now. Now, there isn't a soul that he can actually talk to about his feelings anymore. Maybe Shinra but he was stuck in his world of Celty.

He peered through the glass panel on the door. Hamako was on her headphones and rocking herself on the sofa while reading a book. Most of her face was inside the book, so Izaya couldn't see her clearly. Her headphones however, was clearly having the prints of skulls. Maybe she had liked rebellious stuff, Izaya told himself.

"Mako-chaaan!~ I miss you!~ I haven't seen you for~e~ver~!" Izaya once again helped himself into the shop. Hamako immediately dropped her book and stood up in surprise. To Izaya's surprise, she wore a white framed glasses that was neatly perched on her nose bridge. She immediately took her glasses off and placed it on the coffee table, face as red as tomatoes. It seemed that she remembered Izaya hugging her that time.

Izaya of course took every chance to tease her.

"Oh dear, Mako-chan the tomato fairy remembered a hug from me!~" Izaya's grin grown to a full one. She's rather cute, he thought then paused, cute? Maybe he regards all of his human as cute. Not just her, but only maybe.

"I-Izaya, what do you have here? I-I meant! W-Why are you h-here?!" Hamako picked up her book from the cold floor and put it carefully on the table. She checked it for any creases on its pages, as a distraction for not looking at Izaya. Looking at his handsome face would just make her face get worse. She had just said him handsome!

Hamako embarrassedly covered her face with both of her hands. Izaya looked at her, as he smirked, he probably had a grasp what she was thinking. After all, he had come across a lot of teenagers that fell for his looks. He slowly pried Hamako's hands away from her burning face and whispered in her ears.

"What's Mako-chan thinking?" Hamako, as a normal reaction, tried to flail her arms to escape. She did escape successfully but her arms contacted Izaya's face. Izaya backed away from the aggressive hands and dramatically fall onto the sofa.

"Ow! Ow! Ow! Mako-chan had ruin my face!" Izaya whined in a high pitched. If Hamako wasn't the one who was in fault, she would probably be laughing Izaya right now. She kept apologizing and asked if he needed ice pack or something. Izaya pretended to need one and she ran off to her pantry fridge.

Izaya continued to lie down on the sofa, it was until then he saw the ceiling of the shop. It actually had glowing stars and moon stuck on it. He thought only children did that and he figured Hamako was childish enough anyways. If the shop was dark enough, it would be like looking at the night sky since she painted the ceiling blue.

"H-Here's the i-ice!"

Izaya took the ice pack anyways and gingerly placed in on his face. Hamako finally laughed softly. It was too funny for her, imagine an ice pack on someone's face anyways. Izaya turned to her and looked at her somewhat accusingly and she stopped her laughter, but she was still smiling.

She then went back to the pantry and opened the fridge again. She took a slice of cake and went back to the sofa. Izaya was still lying on her sofa like it was his bed. She chewed the small pieces of the cake while she looked at Izaya. She told herself that he was actually rather attractive but his smirks and habits just puts most people off the dinner plates. Izaya abruptly sat up, dumped the ice pack at Hamako while smiling as if it was natural to throw it. He took off from her shop, claiming he needed to go home.

"Bye bye Mako-chan!~" Izaya walked off like he had never received a smack to the face by Hamako's arms. Before he could step out of the shop though, he spotted a white rose with black stalk made from straws sitting on the florist counter.

_Straw Rose?_


	11. Hamako's sickness

**There you go~ Excuse me as I go and write the next chapters. I tend to not finish stories that I started but I guess I'll finish this one.**

**ShiroRen: Heeeeeeey Renny! I used your name for a minor OC hahaha~ Happy BIRTHDAY MY BESTIE! You're now officially OLD~ hahaha**

**Smile9316: Yaaaaay for nice peopleee! Yea, I do fuel on people's reviews xD I actually just figured there was mild romance so I tried to write a bit more but I'm so absorbed in Hamako's background lol**

**AFK: Uwaaa, you're back! Glad you like the extra chappy! It wasn't exactly a punch to his face but a slap but whuteva! ahahaha~ Hoodie guy? Guessssss xD I updated!**

Izaya spent his whole night wondering about the straw rose and about Hitomi Hamako. He had analysed that the rose was made of straw too but it was not black coloured like the hooded figure's. Instead, it was pure white. Maybe there isn't a connection at all, she was just folding a rose out of straw.

Izaya had even looked on the internet about folding straw into roses. It was probably rather difficult to fold one. After all this sitting in front of his computer, Izaya think he should get out for some fresh air. Though, his fresh air apparently only resides in Ikebukuro. Recently, he found himself in Ikebukuro more often not to look for Shizuo but for a certain Hitomi.

Maybe he should go and find Shizuo for a running game, he's afraid that he had gotten out of shape after these running-less days. His usual thoughts interrupted when he heard a soft wheezing and coughing sounds from an alley. Who would actually be in an alley? He went to check anyways. A small sling bag came in sight at first, but last time Izaya had checked, bags don't wheeze or cough. He walked further in and saw Hamako, her back facing the wall. Her eyes were gleaming with tears but it didn't fall. She was desperately trying to get to her bag but she was rather hopeless at the task.

It was probably come part of his mind or something, but Izaya grabbed the bag and immediate looked for some sort of medication. Her wheezings and coughings were probably from an illness. And there he was right, he found an inhaler and put it in Hamako's hands in fast actions. There was no way his favourite Hamako is going to die right now in front of him. Not like what happened to Mano, not under his watch anymore. She took the inhaler and used it a few times.

Hamako finally calmed down and sighed. Izaya's tensed shoulders finally slumped back down. He wasn't aware that he was holding his breath too.

"T-Thanks... for the inhaler..." She said, somewhat still out of breath.

"No problem Mako-chan!~ Gave me quite a scare!~" Izaya admitted.

"Dinner...? As thanks." Hamako looked at him as she stood back up. She brushed off the dirt and took back the sling bag from Izaya's hands with a nod.

"Sure!~ It'll be like a date for Mako-chan and me~" Izaya grabbed her hand and walked out, no, it's danced out of the alleyway. She was grateful that she had put her bag safely on her before he started his 'dancing'. Soon though, she was the one leading the way.

"Going to Suzume's, Mako-chan?~" Izaya asked, as he noticed this was the direction towards it.

"N-Nope, I'm risking too much by bringing you there..." Hamako replied, hinting that Shizuo was probably there all the time that he wasn't working or running around getting at Izaya.

"Aww!~" Izaya said before he was forced into turning a right turn into another street. The street was full of restaurants with colourful signs.

"Here." She spun herself into a western restaurant and sat herself at a small empty table. Izaya followed her. They ordered something light, both not interested in getting too full or anything.

"Mako-chaaan~ Do you know colour gangs?~"

"Sure, common knowledge and all." Hamako found herself stammering less as soon as she felt comfortable with him and the surrounding. "Everyone here knows about them, right?"

"What about Dollars?" He hadn't answered her rhetorical question.

"Dollars!" She said excitedly, but a bit too loudly. She softened her voice since she found some people looking her way. "I wanted to join them! They're so cool with the gigantic circle. It's going to be just for fun though, but I heard the Yellow Scarves are going against them? It's kinda scary at the same time!"

"What about Black Straw?" Hamako's face flashed a rather sad look but she smiled anyways.

"You're questioning me! I've heard of it but nope, not much knowledge about it." She shook her head, as if she was able to convince him now and then.

"I know. So let me ask you, are you an orphan?" Izaya's smirk resurfaced.

"You're kinda scary. Yes, but I think you already know the answer to that anyways."

"Such an honest girl, Mako-chan!~" Izaya complimented as he finished his dinner. Hamako saw his dinner plate empty and hurried her food too. She wasn't a very slow eater anyways so she finished it in a few minutes. It was already cold though.

"I'll walk you back." Izaya offered as they walked out of the restaurant. He was being such a gentleman today in front of Hamako, he wondered why the sudden change in his personality. Perhaps Hamako being here had really soften him, he wouldn't admit that though.

Hamako was looking at Izaya. He really looked quite similar to someone she knew long time ago. It feels so long ago as she looked up to the starry sky. Maybe she would be able to tell him the reason one day.

So corrupted, she told herself. In this big city, maybe there are many that are corrupted, but not as much as her.

In this dark mess, a blood red flower is growing at a corner.


	12. Black Straw's website

**This is short... but the next chapter would be longer C: I only have pre written until next chapter so my updates are going to be slower since I'm preparing for my final exams ;A; Please be patient! w By the way, I never thanked those that favourited and followed the story. Thank you all! /bows/**

**EverlastingMemories: Yea, I took Renny's name for this xD I thought the name was unisex? Oh well... xD**

* * *

Hamako woke up and went to the bathroom. The house was eerily quiet, now that Ren was gone. There was a faint sound of music that covered the noises of the crowd. She hated crowd noises. As she washed her face, she saw the faint scar that was on her wrist. It was pinkish but it was rather invisible. She consciously rubbed it before walking back out.

After a change of clothes, she sat in front of her laptop on her bed, and typed in an address. It was a private net that required a password to enter. Just like Dollars. She typed in the password as she read it out aloud softly.

"C...o...d...e...R...e...d..." Hamako wondered who with their sane mind would put such a weird password like CodeRed anyways. Large words of 'Black Straw' came onto the screen and a red flame burnt the words before the page showed it's mysterious self. The whole web themed was black and red, and was rather scary in a way. Even the mouse cursor was a red wilted rose.

"Fancy." She mumbled as she found the NOTICE button and clicked on it. There was a new post that was posted yesterday and she clicked her mouse again. After reading the post, she replied that she was attending. Hamako closed her laptop and walked herself to her florist.

She had locked her door and checked twice before leaving the apartment building. She hummed to herself again. On her way, she spot a music shop and there were new stocks of headphones that was displayed on the shop window. She stopped to look and went into the shop. There was many different headphones as she stood there, baffled by the idea to buy every single one but she had not much cash with her.

It was 2 hours later that her phone rang from a message she then knew she was there too long. She quickly took one and bought it before speeding off towards the shop. She was so, so late to open her shop. She checked her phone to stop that annoying chiming ringtone and found a message about some advertisement. She narrowed her eyes and deleted the message immediately.

"Spam mails!" She growled in annoyance. When she had reached her destination, she found Izaya in front of her florist, using his phone for internet. She wondered why he always waits in front of her shop though.

"Tsk tsk!~ Mako-chan's really late!~" Izaya commented as soon as he saw her. She unlocked the door and Izaya slipped inside to his favourite sofa. He then spotted her new headphones that she wore around her neck. There were hints of music blaring out on the speakers since she hadn't paused her song.

"Mako-chan loves red and black, doesn't she?~" Izaya sang, flapping his arms in the air as he lay down on the bed. Hamako ignored him and proceed to turn the air conditioner on. It was stuffy and not long before the flowers would die from the temperature.

She made a pot of tea and sat onto the opposite sofa. The aroma of the tea blended in with the scent of flowers. She handed him one and he took it. He looked at it and saw a floating tea stalk in it.

"It means good luck, you know?" Hamako said, hinting that she had purposely gave him that cup of tea. He smiled and Hamako blushed again, knowing that he understood what she said. She rubbed her face unconsciously and he kept smiling at his amusement.

"N-Never knew you were capable of smiling." She said, trying to change the current atmosphere. It was getting tensed, at least for her. She was easily embarrassed all along and Izaya was using it as his advantage. She tried to change it to no avail.

"Mako-chan doesn't know a lot about me!~" Izaya replied, and he went back to laying down on the sofa, a hand resting on his stomach and the other left dangling off the sofa.

"I know. Maybe more than you know?" Hamako suggested but Izaya didn't really listened to her. He simply wants to enjoy the quiet and peaceful world he hadn't had for years. It seems that the florist had provided a good environment for resting, maybe Hamako should change a florist into some relaxation area?

"No way! I like florists." Hamako immediately denied as soon as Izaya said his suggestion. Izaya then went back to his resting. He couldn't believe it but he fell asleep quite soon with the soft music playing in the background. Hamako had woke him up later at eight at night, claiming she needed to shut her shop.

"I fell asleep!" Izaya sleepily muttered under his breath, trying to make sense to what had happened. Maybe it was because he hadn't slept for two days straight but still, for him to put his guard down... Though he had made it back home rather safely, in his half awake state.

Hamako went home and opened her wardrobe. She grabbed a loose baggy crimson hoodie and pulled the hood over her. She changed her skirts into black shorts and sneakers. She had also put on her new headphones. She turned on her music rather loudly and headed off to the park.

She jogged around the park while she kept glancing at the big clock. When it reached ten exactly, she sat down on a bench, rather satisfied that she ran three laps. She couldn't do much with her bad asthma anyways.

Soon, many other people who had a black straw rose came to the park. They wandered around a bit before spotting her. They looked at her with utmost respect while the tall black hooded figure pulled down his hood and bowed slightly.

His hair was black with highlighted white stripes. His hair was messily but still in style. He looked at Hamako with bright green eyes. He was paying his respects and soon the other members also bowed slightly.

"Lady Hitomi."


	13. Red handed contradictions

**Maybe I should have a set of which days I post...? In that case, I will update every Tuesday and Thursday, I guess. Effective... next week xD I will be rather free after my exams though so yea...**

**Smile9316: It's okay~ Still recognised you from the name~ Thanks for the good luck and patience!**

**AFK: Uwaaaa, Hamako IS Hitomi. Hitomi's the surname for Hamako lol (Hitomi Hamako, e.g. Orihara Izaya) It's Hitomiiiiiii not Hitoki haha~ I don't know... read on~**

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Hamako looked up towards the tall figure and nodded in acknowledgement.

"Hey there, Riku." She smiled at him and asked him, "Is everyone here yet?"

"The young one isn't here yet. Where is he? He tends to follow you." Riku questioned, his eyebrows raised in curiousity.

"Ren Hitomi won't be joining us anymore. Have you heard of the accident of Hiyori?" she waited for confirmation before continuing, "Hiyori's his best friend. He witnessed her death and I sent him to his parents overseas. He won't be returning anytime now."

There was soft whispers amongst the members and Hamako could hear voices of pity and consolations to her. They were a close knit of members after all. Hamako tried to not think about the accident that she had also witness. This was the second event that scarred her life, probably forever.

"So, who's our target today? It seems like you guys are rather busy looking for customers these days? Don't you all have work or studies?" She said while some joked that money came from the skies. She laughed.

"Here." Riku passed her a crumpled piece of paper with hardly readable handwritings.

"It looks like you wrote while Japan had an earthquake!" Hamako exclaimed in her childish voice. The others laughed as Riku apologized with embarrassment.

"Your ears are red." Hamako the captain obvious claimed. He just tugged the tips of his highlighted hair and changed the topic.

"Let's go before it's too late." They then walked in separate ways to an alleyway that Hamako couldn't recognise because Riku was the one who led her there. She pulled her hood back up again as it dropped from the sudden wind earlier.

"Keisuke Shinozaki, age 43. Molested his two daughters, physically abused his wife then finally killed the wife. Threatened his children to not say anything or he will make sure they never see the daylight again. Pathetic." Hamako looked coldly at the sight of the man tied with ropes to ensure he won't run away.

"Any last words? No? Okay, say hi to hell for me." She lit the paper on fire with a lighter and dropped near the man. She turned away, turned up the volume of her music as the other members killed the man. She looked at the time on her phone. It was exactly twelve midnight. Good timing again. The members then cleaned up any traces of evidence like footprints and even the ashes of the paper she set on fire earlier. She closed her eyes.

Hitomi Hamako opened her eyes and stared at the clock on the wall. It showed nine in the morning and she kicked away her blankets. She once again followed her morning routine and washed up. She felt so tired and she wondered why. She already had slept enough hours for her body to hold up.

When she walked back to her bed, she spot the crimson hoodie lying on the short chair. She looked at it for a while before taking it up and and hung it up properly in her wardrobe. She gave it another glance before she closed the wardrobe. After keeping everything neat and tidy, she goes out of her apartment to head to work as usual.

As she walked past an alley, she turned to find a notable amount of police and bystanders that were crowding around a blood splatter. Maybe it was another murder case again? She looked around to find someone to ask, which she then spots Izaya not far away and runs up to him.

"Good morning, Izaya. What's happening there?" Hamako asks curiously. Izaya looked down and found the owner of the voice. He planned to play with words but figured it would be better to watch her reaction to the incident.

"A man who apparently won his case of family abuse and murder with no penalty at all died here. Police deduced that he died around midnight. "

"Oh my gosh! Are you telling me there's a murderer who is out on the streets?" Hamako covers her mouth in astonishment. Then she continued, "But he probably deserved it. He shouldn't have done those things! It's karma hitting hard on him..." She trailed off, pouting.

"So you think people deserve to die?" Izaya asks, wondering what had happened to world's most pure person. Hitomi Hamako had changed so much that he couldn't catch up anymore. Then again, maybe it was his imagination that she had changed.

"Depends...?" She mumbled, her eyes trailing off somewhere distant. Izaya furrowed his eyebrows and he decided he would be stalki- No, following her to see her night activities, if anything she was doing was affecting her. He was puzzled if he was actually protective of her, since she reminded him so much of Amano. Amano was more talkative and is overly-cheerful though.

He had followed her to the shop, spying her from the shop across the street, then following her home while looking at her from a rooftop across. He even brought some sushi to camp out on the rooftop. Izaya had actually planned to stay up all night just to watch her.

Until it was around ten at night, Izaya spotted a figure walking out from her building. At first, he had thought that it was Hamako, but the figure was wearing a boy's clothing and was rather boyish in a sort of way, so he was planning not to follow. Until he saw a black straw daisy sticking out from the boy's cargo pants.

Izaya was following him and suddenly, the hooded boy turned around towards Izaya's direction. He immediately ducked himself into an alleyway. How in the world Ikebukuro had so many amazing alleyways was still curious to him. The boy then shrugged slightly before walking ahead again, thinking that it was his imagination.

The boy hadn't stopped until he reached an abandoned warehouse. It was so typical for a warehouse as a hideout, Izaya thought. The boy then took his hands out of his pocket to reveal a small paper slip, looked at the building and went in. His hands were not seen as he wore thin leather gloves. It was Autumn, no one is yet to wear gloves. Then again, not everyone is normal in Ikebukuro anyways.

Izaya scooted to a nearby window to watch the inside of the building, surprisingly there were quite many lights in there and was rather bright. There were many people inside, chatting and some were even playing chess.

Izaya noted that there were some people who had black straw roses with them, some had black coloured straw folded in different types of flowers and some had dogtags with them instead, like the older version of Black Straw. Not all of the members were male and some are female, there were even children who looked like freshmen. He vaguely wondered if this was a family tradition or something.

Izaya moved forward to take a better look at the members with dogtags, as he presumed they were higher ranked or older members. The action proved to be a bad one as Izaya felt his feet stepped on a broken branch. He tried to quietly remove his feet before it made more sound but it was just making everything worse.

Snap! It made an utmost blatant noise and there was an abrupt hush inside the warehouse. Everyone then proceed to stop their activities and looked outside. Then a short commotion took place and a few members murmured to others about going outside to check.

Izaya instantly turned to sprint for his life. He didn't care anymore if he made a sound or not. The loud rustling noise of the dry leaves made the members aware of his location and unfortunately for Izaya, the professional members were much more nimble and quick on their feet.

"Where do you think you're going?" In a blink of eye, there was someone blocking his escape path. Izaya recognized him as the person who was watching the crime scene the other day. He flipped out his switchblade and tried to attack.

The person disarmed Izaya so quickly by twisting his wrist. His switchblade dropped on the floor and another member picked it up. The person, who apparently is in charge of the three others, signalled them to bring him into the warehouse.

"Let the leader choose his 'execution'." Izaya grimaced at the words. He wondered what would be on the newspaper headlines tomorrow. Probably 'Orihara Izaya dies at an abandoned warehouse without any known evidence for the murder'. Pathetic, he thought, I would rather die in the hands of the monstrous Shizu-chan.

"Yes, Riku." So the man that day is named Riku, or was that another fake name too?

Said person then proceed to throw him onto the floor without any mercy. Izaya immediately starts to talk his way out and tried to take a peek of the leader. He was one hardcore information broker, he blamed it on the habit.

"My Lady, the intruder." Izaya wondered why had the man called the boy a lady, not a lord or master. Perhaps it was the man's mistakes? Said person paused 'her' actions and turned towards him.

"Orihara Izaya?" A ghastly voice broke the silence.

"Oh, I'm famous." He was being sarcastic, even at his death bed. One of the members raised her foot and was about to kick him when 'My Lady' stopped her. 'She' pulled back the hood and looked him in the eye.

Izaya gasped.


	14. Forget me

**It's been a thousand years since I updated but here you go. The story's coming to an end, much to my sadness. Anyways, I'm writing a completely original story so do go read about it? The story title is Rhythm of Heart and the web link is…**

** . (Just change a real dot though xD)**

**Smile9316: Thank you for reviewing again! I hope this one keeps up to the standard (Yes, I'm rambling)**

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"Hitomi Hamako?!" Izaya gasped. It couldn't be, could it? The leader of the elite colour gang, Black Straw, is the sweet and innocent Hamako he knew.

"...Yes, it's me. Feeling shocked and disappointed?" Hamako diverted her sea blue eyes away from him. Her gaze held so many emotions, but mainly disappointment, to be finding him here spying at them. Though, she shouldn't have very much surprise, he was an information broker in the end.

"Shock, actually. You are not the Hamako I know. The Hamako I know won't be doing this." Izaya argued. Hamako shook her head but she simply changed the topic.

"You couldn't recognise me as a girl back then, right?" Hamako paused for a moment, as if waiting for an answer, but she continued before he replied. "I knew someone was following, but I admit I didn't it was you who was following me. You can be a ninja sometimes." She attempted to joke.

"What are you going to do to me?" Izaya promptly questioned her, trying to get her to spill the decision of catching him here. He wondered why he hadn't run by now, since he wasn't tied up or anything, but the members hadn't bothered by the fact he was unbound too. They probably are very sure that he won't make it out the gate.

There was messy voices that filled the air, echoing in the warehouse. The higher ranked members crowded and Izaya's guess was right, they had dogtags with them. To his bewilderment, Riku, who had worn no dogtags could also join the discussion circle. Hamako tried to avoid his questioning gaze.

"We should eliminate him." A man suggested, whose appearance was around thirty years old.

The other members nodded and Hamako immediately looked at them. She bit her inner cheeks and frowned. Maybe she should have gotten rid of Izaya when he was tailing her earlier. It was too late to regret now since he was here already. There's only one last thing that she was able to do.

"You can't! I... I love him! You can't kill him." Hamako's face was firm and determined. She was at the same time, trying not to think what she had just admitted amongst all her members. She pondered how was she going to live down this statement afterwards.

There were many gasps and looks that were passed through all the members that attended the gathering. The older member too had looked at her in disbelief, shock to the ground that she would actually fall for an informant.

"You... You all said I was the leader. I should have my own choices!" Hamako unwillingly dragged her authority in. "I should be the one who will decide his fate." Her voice wavered not a slight bit.

"You're still young, girl. You won't understand the cruelty of life and the world. You're not exposed to the real world yet. The fact there are traitors in the world proves my point." The elder man explained.

Izaya was rather shocked that they were all actually looking at her with those eyes, those eyes that were watching and caring for her. He then realised that this was not just an elite gang, it was also the same time, another family that looks after each other.

"I will stand on Hamako's side." Riku suddenly said, after being silent for such a long time. Hamako immediately looked at Riku with grateful eyes, as he nodded silently in reply. There were another loud noise that sounded through the room again, as the members curiously discuss amongst themselves about the support of Riku. He still, in the end, came from a long line of family that was trusted by the Black Straws for generations.

"We could monitor him, watch him. And if he was to give any clue into revealing us, we could then do something otherwards." Riku suggested, wanting the rest to support his idea. Hamako cursed herself to have not thought of that earlier. At first, the older members frowned but after reconsidering it, they finally hesitantly agreed.

Hamako bent down towards Izaya and looked at his injured wrist. She turned around to ask for the first aid kit and she carefully and slowly bandaged it for him.

"Would be better if you go and check up with Shinra later." She said, and somehow Izaya could hear a bit of the commanding voice in it. He tried to move it but regretted it instantly, it hurt much more than he had expected.

"Sorry, please get a nice sleep after this," Hamako leaned over to gently kiss on his forehead, as she continued saying. "And try to forget about me."

As her words rolled off her tongue like a lullaby, Izaya felt his brain slowing shutting down. He willed himself to not pass out again, but it seems that she had applied some sort of medicine into the bandage earlier. Slowly but steadily, the lights in the warehouse dimmed out and he fell into a deep, deep abyss of sleep.

Izaya woke up, as natural as he could be. His hand touched in forehead, where Hamako had kissed him last time. He winced when his hand got crushed by his body but it seemed to have been wrapped and treated properly. He rolled off his bed and went out to streets immediately.

It was no longer morning but noon as he ran across the street. Hamako's shop was still there but there was a close sign. Where was she at this time of the day? It couldn't be out for lunch because she usually preferred to be in her shop and ordered delivery meals every time.

The beeping sound of her watch made her look at the time. It was already three in the afternoon and she was still looking at the computer screen. In the webpage, there was so many comments on one particular post. She had checked it and it had shown that every single member had commented on it. This time, it was a big thing.

Hamako was just afraid, that it would turn into a chaos instead. She couldn't ignore how the brilliant red rose on her table was starting wilt into a dry brown flower, with its head hanging down.


	15. Memory Fragment

**I'm back… not for long. Exams are in the next bloody (my amazing language!) week, so I was rushing through the whole year's studies like the bullet train. I've got tons of excuses, like my dog ate my computer and so but I guess you guys won't like hearing those. Somewhat my language channel broke down these few days, everything I said came out in a mash-potato form.**

**Smile9316: Glad you still love this story (yay!) Hope you like this chappy!**

**Guest: Oh yeahhhhh! Made ya look more than one chapter! xD I am updating nao! xD**

**Queen Honey Bee: Sorry about slow updates! I had a public holiday today so I wrote it. My aim for each story is around 1k words so it's kinda slow for meeeee~ The rest of story will be slow…ly… up… da….ting… Nah! Just joking hehe.**

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Hamako woke up with a start, once again from the horrible nightmare that wrecked her every single night. Her face was as white as a sheet of blank paper, thinly covered with cold sweat. Her tears collected in her eyes, refusing to fall. She knew it was not normal to consider such dream a nightmare, but every time she saw the pools of blood, those faces of the unknown crowd, the noise of the busy crowd, she would start to panic.

She kicked the blankets away, as she wearily placed her arm over her eyes to cover the invading morning sun. Her free hand immediately slapped on the mp3 player and turned on the loudest, to cover the crowd noise near her small apartment. After adjusting to the bright light, she promptly rolled off the bed and moved towards the kitchen, looking for her soon-to-be breakfast.

Under the stacks of book, Hamako saw a tiny corner of an old photo sticking out. She curiously walked over and pulled it out carefully. Her eyes teared up again at the sight of the golden photo. There was a kind looking man whose hand was putting on top of the head of a very young girl. The man was a rather young father, who was casually dressed in a loose collared shirt. The girl was only around ten or eleven, her summer hat worn on her head, ribbons floating freely in the wind. The background was a beautiful sunset, however mostly covered by the father and daughter.

The most attention seeking part of the photo was the sea blue eyes of both people. It contrasted against all the colours in the picture, as none of them wore blue. Hamako sniffed a bit, recollected herself and looked around for an empty frame. After staring at the now-framed photo, she finally broke off from her trance and continued on her usual routine.

Beep beep! Hamako's phone vibrated until she opened the new message. It was from Riku.

'Be careful on the streets today. Silencers are trying to rat out some people from us for information. They're also carrying weapons, it's best for you to be with someone all times or even go get a defensive weapon. Best to steer away from those quiet streets.'

Riku was over-worrying again, Hamako could take care of herself already! She had been on the streets since twelve. Since... since... her father's death. She replied a quick 'okay' back to him and headed out to the streets, praying that she wouldn't meet any information broker with the surname 'Orihara' today.

It was in the end, still very embarrassing that Hamako had actually kissed him! As much as it wasn't lip to lip, but still... She burrowed her head further into a rabbit-eared hoodie, trying to cover her flushed face. As she cautiously looked around, she found out that Riku was right, there were so many people around the sidewalks that had an "s" styled letter tattoo. She shivered a bit inwardly, wondering what will happen if she was found out.

She guessed she really did need a weapon, or a bodyguard? Hamako wasn't used to being indebted to anyone, so she would get a simple defensive weapon then. Pepper spray? Nah, anyone can hit it out of her hands in five seconds. Maybe an extremely simple Swiss Army Knife. She turned into a nearby camping shop and got one. She smiled like a fool as she stared at the knife, now Riku won't be able to bother her anymore.

It wasn't like she didn't want to have any weapons with her, it was just her general dislike for weapons, she didn't mind some that were used for emergency self-defence. She hated guns the most. Guns that draw blood, she hated them, ever since her traumatic witness of her father's death.

She couldn't forget that fateful day.

_"Papa! I'm home!" The young Hamako exclaimed as she crashed through the front door and fell into her father's arm. She was a very clumsy but cheerful person when she was young._

_"That's early, sweetheart. After you tell Mama that you're home, go and study in your room, okay?" Her father hugged and swung her around before pushing her towards the hallway. Hamako nodded happily and ran towards a photograph._

_"Mama! I'm home! There's so many homeworks today so I'll tell you how did my day go today later!" Hamako clasped her hands and closed her eyes as she muttered to her mother, whom she knew was residing in heaven. She then ran into her room and closed the door as she threw her bag on the bed._

_"It's so tiring today! Thank goodness we have an early leaving from school just now." She slowly closed her eyes again to grab a quick nap before studying._

_BANG! Her blue eyes immediately fluttered open from her sleeping state and jumped off the bed. She softly creaked a slight gap from her door and saw quite a handful of men standing at the doorway, her father is one amongst the men._

_She couldn't hear what the man was saying, but she knew that the speaking man was very proud and violent from his way of speaking. She was an observant child after all. After a few talkings, or rather, angry shoutings, the man roughly shoved her father to floor. _

_And her blue eyes reflected white colours as the gunshots flashed. It was later replaced by the crimson red flowers that bloomed all around his unmoving body. The men then quickly left the house, satisfied. They had thought no one saw them, so they had left their tattoo clearly viewed._  
_The design of the tattoo fiercely imprinted in her mind forever._

_"P-Papa?" Hamako's voice wavered as she cried. She ran to grab the phone, dialing the person she most trusted, others than her father and her best friend._

_"B-B-Brother R-Riku? S-Save papa! Help... me..." She sobbed through the phone as Riku, on the other end, immediately ran out his front door towards her house. He was a considerate person, as he didn't hung up on the phone, indirectly to tell her that he was still there for her._

_The next few days past like a movie, most "normal" friends of her father was told that he had an accident, but most knew better than that. As Hamako attended her father's funeral, she had clinged onto Riku for days, not wanting to let go of her grasp. Riku, too, understood her feelings, took up the role of her guardian. He swore during her father's last day of funeral, that he will take good care of his precious daughter._

_Her actions in the later days made him felt guilty and since Riku kept blaming himself that he was a failure in taking care of others, he had found a faraway relative of hers to take care of her instead. Though, after Hamako's plead for Riku to be still her guardian 'angel', he happily took on the role again._

Hamako could remember the frustrated sigh of Riku when he started comparing Hamako with her past self.

_"Why won't you call me 'brother' anymore? I'm hurt in the heart!" He whined._

Hamako chuckled from the second memory. Since it, at least, brighten her mood for the day. She skipped her way to her shop, messaging Riku upon her safe arrival to the shop. After working the shop for the whole day, content that there wasn't any Izaya in sight, she made her way home.

'Wouldn't it be better if you don't come on December 15? I did promised to be your angel.' Hamako looked at her new message, as if her glare would turn into a fist to hit the sender. She sighed, ignoring the message and lied back down on her bed.

She looked at the small paper calendar.

**Only 10 more days.**


	16. Last favour

**Sorry about the slow update, I'm quite certain I would fail my exams this time ;A; By the way, next chapter would be the laaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa st!**

**Smile9316: Sorry about the lack of Izaya! Hope this chapter fills more in?**

**Kakashi'sboy010886: Glad cha like the change! I was afraid someone would hate it and flaaaaaaaaaaaame me…**

**Upset Honey Bee: -gasp- I've been stalked! I'm still alive for great reasons! –talks rubbish- Anyways, updated ;o I shall ignore da outburst ~**

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Izaya looked out to the window, as his hands were tired from typing nonstop. He had caught wind of a huge movement from colour gang Silence, except that they weren't really much of a colour gang either. They were something like Hamako's gang, Black Straw.

Speaking of Hamako, he hadn't seen her for ages. He couldn't not admit that he had grown fond of her and was actually missing her. Ever since he found out that she was in fact the leader of the elite Black Straw, she seemed to be running away from him. he was disappointed, and maybe more of sad? He wasn't sure if he was still capable of that emotion ever since eleven years ago.

This commotion and rumours about some gang wars the other day had really caught Izaya's attention. It was curious as he wasn't the one who started it, though he doubts that Shizuo would probably think that it was some other reasons. Fair enough anyways. When he had found some connections between Silence and Black Straw, he was immediately intrigued by the information he had gotten.

Apparently, both gangs were already bitter enemies since three decades ago. It started from an accident but both side kept blaming each other, then started the war that shed blood. The original leader of Black Straw had passed away, leaving the next successor, who was Hitomi Hamako. He had also found out distant blood relationships between the Tateyama family, whose head of family was the leader, and the Hitomi family, who adopted Hamako.

Izaya automatically presumed that the Hitomi family didn't want to give up their only son, so Hamako was chosen instead. It was the human's nature, to be bias against their own family. Izaya tapped his fingers on the desk, wondering what would happen between both gangs. He was quite sure that the war that Silence is about to start was going to involve Black Straw, no matter it was directly or indirectly.

'I should tell Mako... but I think she would already know by now. Oh, I get to see her if I used this excuse though.' Izaya thought to himself, chuckling. He couldn't believe that he was actually going soft for Hamako. He felt like he was betraying Tateyama Amano, since he was 'loyal' to his feelings for her all these years. His resolutions of not falling for another person again failing due to the sudden change of appearance of Hamako in his life.

'I couldn't even tell... confess... to her that I had loved her. It was too late.' Izaya grimly told himself, regretting so many things that he had wanted to let the deceased girl know. He walked down the streets of Ikebukuro again, this time heading towards Hamako's florist, hoping that it wasn't closed this time.

And it wasn't. Hamako was inside, whistling an unknown tune to herself. It was a happy tune, but somehow she just couldn't make herself to smile. She continued to frown, not noticing the entrance of Izaya. He sneakily went behind her and whispered.

"G-Gah! What the?!" She swore slightly as she jumped from her high stool. She glared daggers to him and Izaya for once was intimidated by the petite young lady. Thank the heavens above that looks couldn't kill him. After recognising who her 'attacker' was, she immediately mellowed down as she sheepishly apologised.

"Mako-chan is aggressive! Never knew that!~" He dramatically flailed his arms as he produced a notebook from nowhere and started writing in it, as if he was recording all the facts of Hamako. She blushed and shoved away the notebook. A silence occurred as both of them stared at the fallen notebook, Hamako awkwardly cleared her throat.

"S-Sorry about that. What are you here for anyways? You... you shouldn't be near me, you know. And, um, since you're still here in front of me... I guess you did keep your mouth shut this time, huh..." Izaya noticed her usual polite speech was decreasing every time he met her. Perhaps she was just masking her usual roughness? After all, she was suppose to be tough and all since she was a leader of an elite group.

"If Mako-chan wants me to shut my mouth, I would do that gladly~ Everything to impress the cute Mako-chan who is in love with me!~" Izaya taunted, yet lacking the usual malice.

"Ahem... If you're here for that, just please, leave." Hamako impatiently rubbed her face. She had also noticed that her mask was slipping. The stress of that and the upcoming events are frustrating her and she was to be honest, not a very good tempered person at all.

There was this one time when she was angry and scared off the whole bunch of kids that was about to bully Ren. The kids in later days would keep bowing to her like she was some empress. She didn't like it though. Nowadays, she would just try to keep her cool and be a patient person. She's a proper lady, or so she claims.

"Aw~ Mako-chan is being a tough girl!" Izaya taunted again, as it was merely his habit to speak first before thinking through most stuff.

"Maybe... Glad to see you still here?" She mumbled as he strained to hear what she said.

"What did you sa-" Izaya got shoved out of the door as Hamako looked away from him as much as possible. She seemed to be quite upset. Was it because of Silence?

"I've... got some things to settle... Guess I'll see you another time... Stay safe." Hamako said before shooing him away from the shop. After making sure that he wasn't around anymore, she locked the door and walked out.

Her first person she needed to look for would be the strongest man in Ikebukuro, physically. She presumed that Suzume would be with him anyways so she would tell her too. After some walkings, she found her target.

"Shizuo?" Said person immediately spun his head around. It seems that he had left work early today, perhaps from the lack of customers.

"What do you want?" He said, though not in a rude way. He would save all his rude stuff for a flea only.

"Ah. I have a favour to ask of you..."

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**Countdown: 5 days left.**


	17. Finale

**FINALE! Author's note at the ending.**

**Guest: Thanks for your first review owo! **

**Smile 9316: Awwww, sorry about Mako being mean to Izaya~ Continue reading for the ending :3**

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Izaya woke up to the dim sky. It was already reaching noon but the the dark clouds had covered away the bright sun. He might have to stay home since it was going to rain. He casually closed the pushed open the curtains, making sure the windows were closed.

As he came out from his morning shower, he spot a small corner of an enveloped peeking through his front door. Curious, he opened the door and saw a white envelope. A genuine dyed-black rose rested on top of it. Izaya immediately opened the envelope. There was only one sentence in the neatly folded letter.

_'Sorry about yesterday, and I forgot to say goodbye.'_

Izaya knew that she had a phone and could have texted him instead. Hitomi Hamako was a mysterious person so she might have wrote a letter to send a hint instead? And that fresh black rose indicated that it was placed there last night, though the rose itself meant that it might have been trying to tell him that this had something to do with Black Straw.

"Why was it a real rose then?" He asked himself.

Izaya pondered a while before wearing his jacket and heading into the streets of Ikebukuro. It had seemed to him the people on the streets had decreased and gotten more quiet. He had brought the letter with him and intended to look for Hamako for an explanation. The letter wasn't really big, so it neatly fitted in his hand.

Empty, was the word to describe Hamako's shop. It was vacant from some time now and Izaya thought he could see the dust starting to cloud on the tables. There were no longer any flowers in there and most furnitures were covered with cloths or wrappers. It was as if no one had ever been in the place before.

Izaya frowned, wondering what had happened to her. He was afraid, but as per usual, he would never admit it. He felt that her presence here would just erase all his fears immediately, as he feared many things, but it always end up being about her.

Walking back onto the street, he wondered why Shizuo hadn't found his presence yet. Izaya was sure that Shizuo seemed to be always a dog, always able to sniff out his position. He slowly made his way towards Suzume's shop, the girl he found always close to Shizuo and Hamako, not wanting to risk being found by Shizuo.

As he walked on, he continued to be alert, but yet no longer feeling the tense presence that had felt threatening and watching his movements. Izaya was quite certain that watchings were made by Hamako's underlings, so where had they gone to? Aren't they afraid that he would spill the secrets if he wasn't watched?

He had reached Suzume's shop in no time, but only finding it a bit better condition than Hamako's. It still had everything in it, everything still looked normal, except for the close sign that was displayed at the busiest time of the day. Why had both of their shops been closed?

_Phone._

Izaya suddenly remembered that he had phone. He quickly speed dialed Hamako's phone number but all that came through was his extreme confusion and disappointment.

_"Sorry, this number had not yet been registered."_

Pressing another speed dial, he pressed the phone near his ear.

"Hello! This is Shinra speaking!"

Izaya didn't bother to tell him his name, trusting Shinra to at least look at the caller's ID before answering the phone. He quickly spilled his confusion and his need for Celty to help find her. Shinra immediately agree, since he was quite fond of the polite girl. He was rather interested in her feelings towards Izaya, wondering if Izaya would change because of her. His questions were answered now, as he listened to a worried young man.

"Celty is going right now," Shinra muffled his phone and shouted to Celty. "Darling be safe!"

It was drizzling by now. The soft patter of the raindrops seemed not to affect Izaya at all as said person continued to run through from street to street looking for a certain red scarf or sea blue eyes. As he sped across a shop, he heard that familiar tune that Hamako had loved to hum when she was feeling safe or peaceful. It was from the music box behind that shop window.

For a moment, Orihara Izaya could have sworn Hamako's eyes that seemed to glow reflected on the shop window. He spun around, only to have met his unknown disappointment of the day. There was no one there at all, much less a person with natural blue eyes. Most people that were living in this place had coloured contacts, but Izaya insists that Hamako's blue eyes were real and prettier.

The rain just gotten heavier and Izaya continued standing there, without any need of umbrella or shade, eyes staring at the empty space as rushing people tried to get shelter. Now that he was hallucinating, he finally was able to think about the events that had occurred today, starting  
from the time he had woke up.

The genuine, fresh black rose had represented _Hamako and her real feelings towards him._

The letter that was on his doorstep instead of texting him was for him to realise its s_eriousness._  
That only sentence written in it, if Izaya had canceled some words, it would meant '_Sorry, goodbye._'

Izaya's eyes widen as he finally understood everything. This gang war, it was dangerous, she was walking straight into a suicide mission. Now that her sudden disappearance had actually happened so that she wouldn't worry him, his mind was suddenly cleared from all the fog. There was only one thing in his mind, which was 'find Hamako'.

Ding, ding, ding, ding... The sound of the grandfather clock from a nearby antique clock jolted his memory of the geography of Ikebukuro. Hamako was a kind-hearted soul, so most likely she would look for the most remote area to start the war. And the abandoned train track near the empty field had fit the category perfectly.

He turned on his heels and sprinted towards said area. His worry had increased ten folds, his hands gripping slightly tightly on the letter that was soaked wet. He still hadn't heard anything from Celty and it wasn't helping him at all. With great efforts, he reached the train track in time.

Hamako and her whole gang was there, and on her opposite was the Silence. Her long brown hair was let loose from a ponytail, swinging wildly from the wind with her red scarf, her sea blue eyes no longer as warm as he first met her as Akairo, as it was now cold stare. Izaya hated this side of her, Hamako had deserved to have a happy face, and to never worry about anything.

"Mako-chan?" Somehow he still managed to say her nickname.

Hamako turned around and looked at her caller. She flashed a smile at him, though he had found traces of bitterness hiding in it. He ran up to her and she had actually bear-hugged him, in front of her opponents and her allies though no one was in the mood to look shock.

"Let's go home." Izaya said softly as his body was still bent down hugging her.

Hamako shook her head as she tiptoed to his ears and whispered softly.

"I... only wanted to see you one last time. You know, the question you asked me long ago, my answer is yes."

_"Mano? I-I love you! D-Do you love me?"_

_"Mmm... this question, I'll tell you later, Izaya." Amano smiled sweetly._

_"Not fair." Izaya frowned but he didn't mind, as long she hadn't reject him, he still had a chance._

As soon as she said it, she pushed him hard enough for him to be thrown across the track. She double checked him to be fine before calling out loud for Shizuo and Celty. Both of them emerged suddenly behind him and placed each of their arms into Izaya's as he tried to get back to her.

She smiled one last time before turning over to her opponents. She slowly retrieved a gun, a weapon she hated all her life, and clicked off the safety trigger. She coldly looked at Silence and blinked as slowly as she could.

Bang. Bang bang.

Shizuo covered Izaya's ears while Celty covered Izaya's eyes. For once, Shizuo had actually felt sympathy for that flea. No one had deserved to watch the person they loved getting hurt and dying. Not even Orihara Izaya who had done many evil deeds. Shizuo had accepted to do Hamako a favour and he would fulfil his promise. Izaya screamed and scratched, trying to get back to the empty field. Back to Hamako and protect her from everything around her.

Yet he couldn't fight the strength of Shizuo and Celty and was helplessly dragged back to Shinra's place. As they left the scene, Shizuo and Celty couldn't bare to look at the ongoing war at all. They didn't talk at all, only dragging a now too quiet Izaya to the couch. Suzume turned towards the sudden heavy weight on the couch and knew what had happened at once.

For days, Izaya had just stared towards the white ceiling, making no move to leave Shinra's house, only moving when he needed to eat or drink. Shinra and Celty both took care of him while Shizuo had actually occasionally came to visit him. All three knew that pained feeling if their loved ones were supposedly dead as there was no news about Hamako at all.

There was only one thing, that was the Black Straw had won yet the death count was an unbelieving amount. They hadn't knew who had passed on as the members quietly did their jobs to tell only the deceased's family members of their deaths. They then deduced that Hamako had died, since even after half a year, no one came to find them anymore.

Izaya, to Shinra's eyes, seemed to be coping fine. Though he had no idea to what extend, but he still reminded time to time to Izaya that he was here as a friend and was a shoulder to lean on anytime. Shinra, despite his tendency to be oblivious, knew that his friend was having a hard time now.

A year later, Izaya was again visiting that empty grave. He had as usual, brought those fresh black roses in threes and placed them in front of the white marble grave. On it was engraved _'In the precious memory of Hitomi Hamako. 23rd of August 1989 - 15th of October 2012'_.

"Hey Mano... I miss you so." Izaya whispered, looking at the white, spotless grave. The dry leaves rustled and he made note to rake the leaves afterwards. He promised himself that he would keep the compound and the grave to remain the safe even after a long time. It was the most thing that he could have done for her.

Orihara Izaya still didn't change much, except that he was more softer towards the people who considered as friends, like Shinra and Celty. Shizuo and him was still fighting as usual, but Izaya noticed that Shizuo had actually gone slacker on him these days. Izaya would actually keep a flower pot of black roses in his apartment, and was taking good care of it. It served as a reminder to his Tateyama Amano, his Hitomi Hamako.

"I didn't know you miss me." A gentle voice sounded behind him and he turned around as soon as the familiar voice sounded.

Amano was standing there with Riku. Nothing had changed to her except for a light pink scar on her arm. Riku instead, had an eyepatch over his left eye and seemed to be holding a walking stick. Otherwise, Amano looked the same, still looking like the gentle and cheerful she used to be before becoming Hitomi Hamako.

_"I'm home."_

_**Fin.**_

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**So guys… and girls~ How's the ending? Since this is the last chapter of Transparent Answer, why don't leave a review about the ending?~ C'mon folks, review about your opinion of the ending… This is basically a first story with chapters that I actually enjoyed writing so much and finished it! So once again, review and um… maybe favourite it?**


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